PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN // Six more bodies have been found in the wreckage of a huge bomb blast that ripped through a crowded marketplace in troubled north-west Pakistan, taking the toll to 27, police said yesterday. An explosives-laden car blew up in a busy shopping area on Friday night in the city of Peshawar, the capital of the violence-hit province bordering Afghanistan. The explosion also wounded dozens of people, destroyed several shops and hotels and more than 50 vehicles in Peshawar's Qisakhawani bazaar.
"We found six bodies buried under the debris of two destroyed hotels and one adjoining house. Among the dead was a 12-year-old boy and a woman," said Noor Mohammad, a police official. Witnesses said the explosion ripped open a natural gas pipeline, creating a blaze that spread to nearby buildings and shops. The blast came hours after six people died in a car bomb explosion at a market in the semi-autonomous Orakzai tribal district near Peshawar.
The deadly explosions were the latest in a wave of suicide and other attacks that have claimed more than 1,500 lives in the past 16 months. Peshawar is close to Pakistan's semi-autonomous tribal zones, which border Afghanistan and where government forces have been battling pro-Taliban and al Qa'eda-linked militants. * Agence France-Presse
